Cheap, accurate Air Drop Mortar could weaponize many small unmanned aircraft.

The US military and CIA have used "drone strikes" heavily in the war in Afghanistan and the hunt for members of Al Qaeda. They've fired Hellfire missiles from the long-range Predator, Reaper, and Global Hawk unmanned aircraft, killing over 3,000 people so far with such attacks. But at 100 pounds, the Hellfire weighs almost as much as some small drones, and it costs tens of thousands of dollars. Add that to the cost of flying the big drones that carry them, and it makes for a very expensive way to kill someone.

But the economics of "precision-strike" drone warfare may change very soon. The US Army and General Dynamics announced today that they have successfully tested a weapon that could turn small unmanned aircraft into small-scale automated precision-attack bombers. General Dynamics' Ordnance and Tactical Systems unit and the Army Armament Research and Development Engineering Center successfully demonstrated they could shell targets from a small drone armed with GPS-guided 81-millimeter mortar rounds.

Originally designed to be fired from mortar tubes on the ground, GPS-guided mortar rounds started to be deployed to US troops in Afghanistan last year. The guidance is part of a fuse attached to an otherwise-conventional mortar round that controls the stabilization fins on the shell. The system tested by ARDEC and General Dynamics (called the Air Drop Mortar) turns GPS-guided mortar rounds into "smart" bombs, programming them with GPS coordinates through a specially designed rack on the drone.

In a series of three tests using a TigerShark drone—a 200-pound drone with a 17-foot wingspan capable of taking off and landing on its own—the Air Drop Mortar (ADM) dropped the 10-pound test shells from about 7,000 feet. They fell within seven meters of the designated target in every test. The blast radius of a high-explosive 81-millimeter mortar shell is about 35 meters.

There are a number of military advantages to dropping mortar rounds from drones. Drones obviously have a longer reach than artillery, and they can linger over an area for long periods and attack without warning (the TigerShark drone can stay in the air for up to eight hours). And compared to the missiles typically carried by DoD and CIA drones, mortar rounds are dirt-cheap.

But there are other potential uses for the ADM. Mortar shells can also carry non-lethal contents, such as smoke and gas, so the potential applications of mortar-armed drones could easily extend into law enforcement and homeland security. (Yes, small drones could be launched from a distance to drop shells to disperse crowds.) Law enforcement agencies are already looking at the potential of using drones with non-lethal weapons. The sheriff's department of Montgomery County, Texas has expressed interest in arming its Shadowhawk helicopter drones with tear gas grenades, rubber bullets, and tasers.

Of course, the accuracy of the ADM, and of the drones that carry the system, could be put at risk by GPS jamming technology. The Iranian forces allegedly used such tactics to capture a CIA RQ-170 Sentinel stealth drone last year. And the general security of drone systems is already in question. The video feed from many US drones is unencrypted, and has been intercepted in the past by enemies on the ground using satellite communications monitoring software.

Large scale conflicts are a thing of the past; just as the American Revolutionary War paved the way toward guerilla-syle tactics and did away with firing lines, so will the drone do away with manned bombers and "carpet bombing" artillery crews. EDIT: Fixed for clarity and timeperiod.

Why risk an aircraft worth $50m or more, plus a crew of human lives to bomb a tiny target? It makes no viable economic sense. We're seeing the emergence of a new kind of warfare, favoring smaller teams of highly trained operators, supported by unmanned drones & fleets of intel-gathering satellites.

Are the smaller units more prone to failure than the bigger drones? Not so much a concern for military applications but for law enforcement I don't want little RC drones dropping out of the sky landing on kids in their backyard.

I have a big problem with rubber bullet ammo on L.E. drones - Putting another layer of tech in between the operator and the trigger mechanism is a recipe for disaster (technical error, mechanical failure or hacking/ inadvertent interference). I want the person who pulls that trigger 'theoretically' 100% responsible for their actions.---On another note it will be interesting to see what rioters will do when there is not a police force presence to focus their anger on from being assaulted by disbursement munitions. I'm having L.A. riot flashbacks now.

But there are other potential uses for the ADM. Mortar shells can also carry non-lethal contents, such as smoke and gas, so the potential applications of mortar-armed drones could easily extend into law enforcement and homeland security. (Yes, small drones could be launched from a distance to drop shells to disperse crowds.) Law enforcement agencies are already looking at the potential of using drones with non-lethal weapons. The sheriff's department of Montgomery County, Texas has expressed interest in arming its Shadowhawk helicopter drones with tear gas grenades, rubber bullets, and tasers.

Do not want. The last thing we need is a layer of abstraction between trigger happy law enforcement and the people they're obliged to Serve and Protect.

You would hope so. The main reason is because the American military could pretty much destroy any other army in a weekend. Lets hope that large scale conflicts do not return once this is not a given anymore. I am pretty sure drones are not as great anymore when the enemy still has airplanes in the air. Which tend to be superior in pretty much any regard with the exception of price per flight hour

Large scale conflicts are a thing of the past; just as the American Revolutionary War paved the way toward guerilla-syle tactics and did away with firing lines, so will the drone do away with large bombers and "carpet bombing".

Why risk an aircraft worth $50m or more, plus a crew of human lives to bomb a tiny target? It makes no viable economic sense. We're seeing the emergence of a new kind of warfare, favoring smaller teams of highly trained operators, supported by unmanned drones & fleets of intel-gathering satellites.

Large scale conflicts are a thing of the past; just as the American Revolutionary War paved the way toward guerilla-syle tactics and did away with firing lines, so will the drone do away with large bombers and "carpet bombing".

Why risk an aircraft worth $50m or more, plus a crew of human lives to bomb a tiny target? It makes no viable economic sense. We're seeing the emergence of a new kind of warfare, favoring smaller teams of highly trained operators, supported by unmanned drones & fleets of intel-gathering satellites.

This is the new face of warfare.

There was a really fascinating piece in Vanity Fair recently called "The Hunt for Geronimo" in which it is revealed that the President considered having a "Small Tactical Munition" delivered via drone to kill Osama Bin Laden during one of the walks they believed he took each day inside of his Abotabad compound. In the end it was decided that the chance of failure was too high, so the full-scale raid took place instead, but it isn't hard to see why the Pentagon / DOD would be furiously pursuing these technologies. Risking dozens of lives, violating the airspace of a sovereign nation, and the tens of millions of dollars spent resourcing missions like that which killed Bin Laden... versus a $25,000 drone.

Here's the relevant quote from that article

Vanity Fair wrote:

Meanwhile, another option was being tested—Vice-Chairman Cartwright’s magic bullet, in the form of a small guided munition that could be fired from a tiny drone. No one involved with planning the mission will discuss its particulars, but the weapon may well have been a newly designed Raytheon G.P.S.-guided missile, about the length and width of a strong man’s forearm. The missile can strike an individual or a vehicle without harming anything nearby. Called simply an S.T.M. (Small Tactical Munition), it weighs just 13 pounds, carries a 5-pound warhead, and can be fired from under the wing of a small drone. It was a “fire-and-forget” missile, which meant you could not guide it once it was released. It would find and explode on the precise coordinates it had been given. Since The Pacer tended to walk in the same place every day, Cartwright believed the missile would kill him, and likely him alone. It placed no American forces at risk.

Only if we realllly make Canada or Mexico mad. Anything big enough to fly across the Pacific or Atlantic is going to have to be a lot bigger than the aircraft being discussed here, which makes it that much easier to detect. America's geographic isolation has always been a huge strategic & defensive advantage.

place instead, but it isn't hard to see why the Pentagon / DOD would be furiously pursuing these technologies.

Most drones are not flown by the DOD, but rather the CIA.

CIA operators of course, do not follow military protocol when eliminating targets and are immune from prosecution( ie targeting first responders, ambulances, police etc). They truly are "licensed to kill".

Quote:

at least 474 civilians have been killed in Pakistan alone and that at least 50 civilians have died in follow-up strikes, in which civilians who came to the aid of victims of previous strikes were killed.

But there are other potential uses for the ADM. Mortar shells can also carry non-lethal contents, such as smoke and gas, so the potential applications of mortar-armed drones could easily extend into law enforcement and homeland security. (Yes, small drones could be launched from a distance to drop shells to disperse crowds.) Law enforcement agencies are already looking at the potential of using drones with non-lethal weapons. The sheriff's department of Montgomery County, Texas has expressed interest in arming its Shadowhawk helicopter drones with tear gas grenades, rubber bullets, and tasers.

Do not want. The last thing we need is a layer of abstraction between trigger happy law enforcement and the people they're obliged to Serve and Protect.

Sadly, sometimes a layer of abstraction can actually achieve more humanistic results than those seen in tense police-civilian direct interactions. It's hard to say where the dehumanizing effects of abstraction balance against the highly emotional, highly stress factored responses often seen in direct conflict situations. Especially if there is strong protocol in place which emphasizes humanistic and due process concerns, where those protocols are more likely to be held to in the abstracted situation.

Still, I'm not really comfortable with the idea. I'd also be concerned at where it would fit into the police-civilian dynamic from the other side. You could potentially see escalations to lethal force because people would feel less concerned with taking pot shots at drones, which the police might interpret as attempted lethal attacks and respond to in kind. That and the types of animosity it could engender.

Domestic situations and sentiments are notoriously less forgiving for innocent bystanders getting caught in a less than perfectly precise strike, even of the nonlethal sort.

I am pretty sure drones are not as great anymore when the enemy still has airplanes in the air. Which tend to be superior in pretty much any regard with the exception of price per flight hour

Depends. A $50 million air-superiority aircraft can carry, what, 8-10 air-to-air missiles? At tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars each? If I can launch 10-20 drones per fighter the enemy can field, they soon won't be able to take them all out, certainly not cost-effectively. That's the advantage of drones, in theory: no pilot in the craft, so you don't need support equipment or millions of dollars of training that go to waste of the craft is shot down. Meaning you can make relatively cheap aircraft, and build/deploy a lot of them.

But there are other potential uses for the ADM. Mortar shells can also carry non-lethal contents, such as smoke and gas, so the potential applications of mortar-armed drones could easily extend into law enforcement and homeland security. (Yes, small drones could be launched from a distance to drop shells to disperse crowds.) Law enforcement agencies are already looking at the potential of using drones with non-lethal weapons. The sheriff's department of Montgomery County, Texas has expressed interest in arming its Shadowhawk helicopter drones with tear gas grenades, rubber bullets, and tasers.

Do not want. The last thing we need is a layer of abstraction between trigger happy law enforcement and the people they're obliged to Serve and Protect.

Trigger happy? Are you seriously THAT simple? You are implying people are routinely shot by law enforcement without justification. What a load. The reality is law enforcement as a whole show a hell of a lot of self-control. You are trying to apply the bad behavior of a very small handful of people to all law enforcement officers.

Given the enormous cost of the US military I think it would be worth considering ditching the cold war type of weapons in favor of lighter and more drone based military. Sure that will pose problems against say Russia or China should there ever be a war. But it seems a huge waste of resources to spend so much to defend against very very unlikely wars and little on equipment useful in wars which will likely happen.

Cold war type weapons should instead be kept in storage or one should retain production capacity, ready to ramp it up should the world situation change. Should Russia or China pose a danger one would know years in advance and could start rebuilding conventional military.

Why do this? The US has a huge budget shortfall and needs to get the debt down. Why not cut expenses on something that does not add to the welfare of anybody? The US spends more on its military than the rest of the world combined. Does that really make sense?

I want the person who pulls that trigger 'theoretically' 100% responsible for their actions.

At the same time (and agreeing with this) it's worth asking whether drones might not potentially allow for some degree of better accountability via taped video feeds, recorded operator commands, etc.

I'm not saying it's necessarily the case, much less always the case (especially in altitude situations/etc, or if strikes were to be "called in" where the operator could not personally verify targets via their displays), but rather mentioning it for consideration. Recording police-civilian interaction incidents is a hugely important tool in maintaining responsibility and accountability.

You would hope so. The main reason is because the American military could pretty much destroy any other army in a weekend.

The US military hasn't fought a real Army since Vietnam.

And that wasn't a resounding victory.

No modern military on earth has seen any real combat in a VERY long time. Why? Modern weapons make real combat a much scarier thought than in the past.

A buddy of mine who went to Desert Storm Part 1 described fighting over there to be surreal. He said the Iraqis were so out classed and out gunned it made many of them not take the fighting all that seriously.

You would hope so. The main reason is because the American military could pretty much destroy any other army in a weekend.

The US military hasn't fought a real Army since Vietnam.

And that wasn't a resounding victory.

we did destruction fine.when it came time to hang around is when the casualties went up.

Actually it was the politicians who lost the war for us. They tied the hands of those who were giving the orders so we weren't allowed to wage war. Vietnam would have likely went VERY differently had the politicians "let lose the dogs of war."

Comes across as a fluff and propaganda piece with a small caveat at the end about some concerns. It is just another way to take away peoples rights such as due process, the right of assembly and a host of others.

You would hope so. The main reason is because the American military could pretty much destroy any other army in a weekend.

The US military hasn't fought a real Army since Vietnam.

And that wasn't a resounding victory.

The US military didn't fight a real army _in_ Vietnam. That was a classic asymmetric war; they shot anyone and everyone that wasn't them, and the US did rather the opposite. Hell, they even stopped bombing the harbors where military supplies were coming in.

Pascal S wrote:

While the tear-gas in a shell dropped for crowd control might be safe, I suspect being hit in the head by a multi-kilogram hunk of steel dropped from 8000ft would prove anything but "non-lethal".

Properly they're "less lethal", not "non-lethal". Even in the event of a riot, the probability of someone being hit by the casing (which will not be multi-kilogram; the armed munition is only 10lb, and mortars are very thin-walled) is very small. It's like tasers: yes, they can kill you, it's just extremely unlikely.

I can't help but think of the SAR possibilities of this after adding a parachute (unless it's going into water). Sinking ship? Drop some guided munitions with 8lbs of inflatable boat and a 1lb compressed-air cylinder. Drop some with 10lbs of (admittedly nasty) survival rations and purified water packets. Massive blizzard? Target front yards with food and chem warmers. Ran out of insulin? Give it a few hours, and a 9lb package of it will--almost literally--hit your doorstep. If the drone crashes, you've saved a pilot and the recipient is no worse off; they'd've not gotten their delivery anyway. Avalanche traps skiiers? You can fit a good tent and some decent cold-weather gear. Hell, with a parachute, it may just be tent stakes and rods, with the 'chute as the shelter.

You know, now that I think about it, there are lightweight stainless-steel stoves; if you used the body of the munition as a stove with a few parts contained inside, some cold-weather gear and rations, and the 'chute as a shelter, you could make a pretty tiddly cold-weather camp bomb.

There's a lot of good stuff that can go into a 9lb or so payload. Aside from C4 or whatever they use as a charge.

Comes across as a fluff and propaganda piece with a small caveat at the end about some concerns. It is just another way to take away peoples rights such as due process, the right of assembly and a host of others.

Last I checked rioting and destroying public and private property aren't rights. I have yet to see riot police show up to disperse PEACEFUL gatherings like those of the Tea Party. Now we did see them called out to deal with the Occupy folks when they started rioting... So please fill us in. What rights are you referring to that are being taken away?

You would hope so. The main reason is because the American military could pretty much destroy any other army in a weekend.

The US military hasn't fought a real Army since Vietnam.

And that wasn't a resounding victory.

we did destruction fine.when it came time to hang around is when the casualties went up.

Actually it was the politicians who lost the war for us. They tied the hands of those who were giving the orders so we weren't allowed to wage war. Vietnam would have likely went VERY differently had the politicians "let lose the dogs of war."

Yeah, we would have ended up in a shooting war with China. There was never going to be a good outcome for the US in Vietnam, ever, and that goes from the very beginning after WW2 when we chose to support the French in retaining their colony rather than supporting Ho Chi Minh, who, after we turned him down, instead went to China and the USSR for support.

Even a GPS guided mortar bomb is expensive ($7000 for the 120mm Roll-Controlled Guided Mortar shell), relative to an unguided one ($50-100).

Why drop a GPS guided bomb from a GPS guided drone, when you can use your GPS guided drone to dive-bomb the target.

Using manual aiming, ace WW2 dive bombers pilots got 25m CEP.

With GPS, laser range finder, a computerised aiming system, and without having to worry about G-force induced blackouts, a dive bombing drone should be able to achieve the 10m CEP of the 120mm RCGM, or better.

Even a GPS guided mortar bomb is expensive ($7000 for the 120mm Roll-Controlled Guided Mortar shell), relative to an unguided one ($50-100).

Why drop a GPS guided bomb from a GPS guided drone, when you can use your GPS guided drone to dive-bomb the target.

Using manual aiming, ace WW2 dive bombers pilots got 25m CEP.

With GPS, laser range finder, a computerised aiming system, and without having to worry about G-force induced blackouts, a dive bombing drone should be able to achieve the 10m CEP of the 120mm RCGM, or better.

This idea is a step backwards in precision munitions, and drone control in the first place. Do you have any idea how less accurate, more prone to failure (and fucking crashing) it would be to try and train your pilots to "dive bomb" with drones?

EDITed to add: Drones don't handle like fighterbombers; if you try and maneuver your drone like a fighterbomber, it's akin to trying to drive a BMW Mini in a damn F1 race.

Trigger happy? Are you seriously THAT simple? You are implying police are routinely shot by law enforcement without justification. What a load. The reality is law enforcement as a whole show a hell of a lot of self-control. You are trying to apply the bad behavior of a very small handful of people to all law enforcement officers.

There are lots of good cops out there. I'd even say that the majority of them are good. But there's also a lots of power hungry control freaks and departments run by people living out unrequited .mil special ops fantasies and are more than willing to put a boot on anyone that threatens their idea of "law and order", and I'd put any department that is seriously wanting a drone that can can fire rubber bullets and drop tear gas bombs in that latter category. It's those people we should all be afraid of, not the career badge walking a beat.

Trigger happy? Are you seriously THAT simple? You are implying people are routinely shot by law enforcement without justification. What a load. The reality is law enforcement as a whole show a hell of a lot of self-control. You are trying to apply the bad behavior of a very small handful of people to all law enforcement officers.

There are lots of good cops out there. I'd even say that the majority of them are good. But there's also a lots of power hungry control freaks and departments run by people living out unrequited .mil special ops fantasies and are more than willing to put a boot on anyone that threatens their idea of "law and order", and I'd put any department that is seriously wanting a drone that can can fire rubber bullets and drop tear gas bombs in that latter category. It's those people we should all be afraid of, not the career badge walking a beat.

There was a really fascinating piece in Vanity Fair recently called "The Hunt for Geronimo" in which it is revealed that the President considered having a "Small Tactical Munition" delivered via drone to kill Osama Bin Laden during one of the walks they believed he took each day inside of his Abotabad compound. In the end it was decided that the chance of failure was too high, so the full-scale raid took place instead, but it isn't hard to see why the Pentagon / DOD would be furiously pursuing these technologies. Risking dozens of lives, violating the airspace of a sovereign nation, and the tens of millions of dollars spent resourcing missions like that which killed Bin Laden... versus a $25,000 drone.

Here's the relevant quote from that article

Vanity Fair wrote:

Meanwhile, another option was being tested—Vice-Chairman Cartwright’s magic bullet, in the form of a small guided munition that could be fired from a tiny drone. No one involved with planning the mission will discuss its particulars, but the weapon may well have been a newly designed Raytheon G.P.S.-guided missile, about the length and width of a strong man’s forearm. The missile can strike an individual or a vehicle without harming anything nearby. Called simply an S.T.M. (Small Tactical Munition), it weighs just 13 pounds, carries a 5-pound warhead, and can be fired from under the wing of a small drone. It was a “fire-and-forget” missile, which meant you could not guide it once it was released. It would find and explode on the precise coordinates it had been given. Since The Pacer tended to walk in the same place every day, Cartwright believed the missile would kill him, and likely him alone. It placed no American forces at risk.

As compelling and interesting as that idea sounds, I think it's best that we take a cautious and skeptical view of these suggestions from Cartwright. After all, wasn't he the guy who conspired to undermine peace talks with the Klingons by way of justifying and instigating a large scale military conflict with them?

While the tear-gas in a shell dropped for crowd control might be safe, I suspect being hit in the head by a multi-kilogram hunk of steel dropped from 8000ft would prove anything but "non-lethal".

Reading this and Panther Modem's quote of '$7000 for a 120mm Roll-Controlled Guided Mortar shell' one could just drop kinetic kill bombs. Think of a GPS guided brick, or GPS guided bowling ball for that matter. Strap a small GPS kit on the equivalent of a lead filled pipe or tire iron and you have a weapon that can do the job quickly and cheaply.

Granted, I'm just talking out my ass here but something similar could technically be done with a small camera, guidance, and GPS attached to a dense inanimate object. I find it morbidly humorus to think death from above could be delivered as a #10 can of baked beans.

place instead, but it isn't hard to see why the Pentagon / DOD would be furiously pursuing these technologies.

Most drones are not flown by the DOD, but rather the CIA.

CIA operators of course, do not follow military protocol when eliminating targets and are immune from prosecution( ie targeting first responders, ambulances, police etc). They truly are "licensed to kill".

Quote:

at least 474 civilians have been killed in Pakistan alone and that at least 50 civilians have died in follow-up strikes, in which civilians who came to the aid of victims of previous strikes were killed.